Literary Mama Blog

Literary Reflections Selected Short- February

Literary Reflections is pleased to announce that, beginning this month, we'll be selecting one writing prompt response each month to feature as a short on our blog. Check out our section for more information on how to be considered for future Selected Shorts.

In February's prompt, we asked readers to "Write about something from the natural world that functions as a metaphor for your experience of motherhood."

Jennifer Gifford wrote,

"One September morning the newspaper warned that a bear cub had been hit on the interstate and the mother bear was likely to pace there looking for her baby. Reading this at seventeen weeks pregnant with my first baby, I wept at the notion. A week later, my own baby was dead.

Nights passed and spring came. Before my baby’s death I might have said that mothering and spring – growing things – have much in common. Reap what you sow, nurture, feed, pay attention…and they will grow. Now I understand the metaphor differently. Throw some geraniums in the window box and walk away. Mow over the chives and hack back the roses. They’ll grow or die whether I love them or hate them, despite my efforts to care for them or ignore them or kill them. Fertilizer, water, talking to them; it’s not that it doesn’t matter what I do. Matter cannot be destroyed, it just changes shape, right? There are forces bigger than me that take care of things, or don’t. My baby was starving and suffocating in my womb, ready to die but nature wouldn’t let her yet. I terminated my pregnancy and sent her ashes to grow into space. My first act of motherhood was to send us face down into raw dirt, suffocated by violent animal grief.

So that spring my garden grew despite my rage. I glared at the petunias and denied them water, yet if they wilted, I wilted in response, wounded by their inability to survive my abuse. My penance was dizzy weeding, newly pregnant again, blood pumping furiously, trying to make the bending and brooding look “normal” – everything’s ok, just taking care of my garden!

Years later I watched a television show about polar bears while my babies slept in their beds. A baby bear swam with her mama through stormy cold ocean, both of them tossed awkwardly in the waves. The narrator gravely explained the purpose of their treacherous journey, and then showed a dead polar cub washed up on the shore. Why didn’t she just sink? Where was her mama? Naturally, the next scene was of a healthy pair, mother and baby, resting in the sun, waiting expectantly."

By Jennifer Gifford, jgifford8 at yahoo dot com

Bloggers Needed!

MotherTalk is looking for mama bloggers who would like to review books that appeal to women and mothers who love to read. They're currently looking for people to review James Patterson's latest YA novel, Maximum Ride 3, as well as Susan O'Doherty's Getting Unstuck Without Coming Unglued: A Woman's Guide to Unblocking Creativity ... with lots more great books coming!

Bloggers are paid for their reviews. If you'd like to sign up, go to http://mother-talk.com/wp/?page_id=5 to read the FAQs and subscribe.

Calling All Mama-Poets!

Violeta Garcia-Mendoza, LM's Literary Reflections Editorial Assistant, is pleased to announce her 10 week workshop for beginner mama poets. If you're an expecting, new, birth, step, adoptive or grandmama wanting to learn more about the joys of poetry, as well as create and present your own poems in an encouraging and inspiring workshop format, this is the place for you!

Among others, topics will include: reading & writing as a poet, poetry of remembering & remembrance, forms and how to make them relevant, and the rigors and rewards of revision.

The workshop will run from July 1st to September 9th. Cost is $250. Class size is limited. For more information or to register, please write violeta724@earthlink.net.

Contest: Are You a Writer Mama (or Papa)?

Writer's Digest wants to hear from you on the topic of "When Parenting and Writing Collide." Write your best original, unpublished parenting-and-writing story in a 500-word essay and email it to publicity(at)fwpubs.com with "Writer Mama contest" in the subject line.

Christina Katz, author of Writer Mama: How to Raise a Writing Career Alongside Your Kids will select the top three entries. The first-place entry will be published in an upcoming issue of "Writer's Digest" magazine; second- and third-place entries will be posted on WriterMama.com. All winners will receive a signed copy of "Writer Mama." All entries must be e-mailed by March 31.

The fine print: The entry must be written in the body of the e-mail; attachments will not be accepted or opened. Each entry should include your name, address, telephone number and e-mail address. Only the winning writers will be contacted, and entries will not be returned. "Writer's Digest" retains first-time rights to run the winning entries in the magazine and/or on their website or associated websites, after which all rights return to the author. The decisions of the editors are final.

Women writing op-eds

Fellow LM editor Caroline Grant sent me a link to this recent NYT article about Cathy Orenstein teaching women to write op-eds. My favorite quote?

“I try to convey the idea that there is a responsibility,” she said. “Op-ed pages are so enormously powerful. It’s one of the few places open to the public. Where else is someone like me going to get access? It’s not like I can call up the White House: ‘Hello?’ ”

April Parent-Lit Workshop Now Open for Registration

Susan Ito's January Parent Lit Writing Workshop is off to a terrific start, with fantastic discussions, a wonderful bonding community of parent writers, and of course, great writing.

The next session (April 1-June 3) is now open for registration. Find out more and register here.

Anyone who has had a child knows that parenting is one of life’s most exhilarating, awesome, maddening, humbling, crazymaking, joyful and wrenching experiences–which is what also makes it excellent inspiration for writing. This past decade has shown an explosion in “Parent-Lit,” or the literature of parenthood, in all forms: creative nonfiction, poetry and fiction.

This workshop is for anyone who wants to tap that rich vein in their writing. It’s for new parents, prospective parents, grandparents, stepparents, adoptive parents and birth parents. It’s for people all over who want to come together and share their stories and their words, to learn something about the craft of writing.

It’s not easy for some parents who want to write to get out of the house for a writing workshop. So this workshop will allow parents to participate while breastfeeding, sitting at home in a robe and pajamas, hanging out at the playground (with wireless internet, that is) or in the wee hours of the morning.

About the class:

The class will run for 10 weeks, starting April 1, 2007. Fee for the class is $350. Participants will learn the fundamentals of both creative nonfiction and fiction writing, using parenthood as a theme. We will read and discuss published examples of great parent-lit, and write some of our own. Assignments will consist of a combination of short exercises and more developed projects. If schedules permit, we may have several live “chats” via instant messaging. Class size is limited to ten.

Workshop topics will include (more to come, based on class requests):

* Turning Life Into Fiction
* The Parent Pantoum: the Poetry of Repetition
* The Many Faces of Creative Nonfiction
* Writing Columns: the Slice of Life
* Taking a Stand: Writing Op-Ed and Opinion Pieces
* Flash Fiction: writing short-shorts
* My Family, My Material: How to be intimate, yet not invasive when writing about relatives

Online Parent-Lit Writing Workshop to Start in January

Starting January 7, 2007

Anyone who has had a child knows that parenting is one of life's most exhilarating, awesome, maddening, humbling, crazymaking, joyful and wrenching experiences--which is what also makes it excellent inspiration for writing. This past decade has shown an explosion in "Parent-Lit," or the literature of parenthood, in all forms: creative nonfiction, poetry and fiction.

This workshop is for anyone who wants to tap that rich vein in their writing. It's for new parents, prospective parents, grandparents, stepparents, adoptive parents and birth parents. It's for people all over who want to come together and share their stories and their words, to learn something about the craft of writing.

It's not easy for some parents who want to write to get out of the house for a writing workshop. So this workshop will allow parents to participate while breastfeeding, sitting at home in a robe and pajamas, hanging out at the playground (with wireless internet, that is) or in the wee hours of the morning.

About the class:

The class will run for 10 weeks, starting January 7, 2007. Fee for the class is $350. Participants will learn the fundamentals of both creative nonfiction and fiction writing, using parenthood as a theme. We will read and discuss published examples of great parent-lit, and write some of our own. Assignments will consist of a combination of short exercises and more developed projects. Class size is limited to ten.

Workshop topics will include (more to come, based on class requests):

* Turning Life Into Fiction
* The Parent Pantoum: the Poetry of Repetition
* The Many Faces of Creative Nonfiction
* Writing Columns: the Slice of Life
* Taking a Stand: Writing Op-Ed and Opinion Pieces
* Flash Fiction: writing short-shorts
* My Family, My Material: How to be intimate, yet not invasive when writing about relatives
* Fun with Research

About the instructor:

Susan Ito is fiction co-editor and columnist (starting December 2006)at Literary Mama. She co-edited the anthology A Ghost At Heart's Edge: Stories & Poems of Adoption. Her work has appeared in The Essential Hip Mama: Writing from the Cutting Edge of Parenting, Growing Up Asian American, Making More Waves: New Writing By Asian American Women and many other journals and anthologies. She is the mother of two daughters, a preteen and a teen.

Email susan@susanito.com for more detailed information, or to enroll.

Call for Submissions: Gravity Pulls You In

Vicki Forman and Kyra Anderson (This Mom) are looking for essay submissions for their anthology, Gravity Pulls You In:

Gravity Pulls You In, a work in progress, is an anthology of beautifully written essays that describe the experiences of parents raising children on the autism spectrum. We are looking for the piercing truth that can be funny, irreverent, illuminating, tender, moving, but always deeply respectful. We invite all voices that will be at once familiar to any parent but also specific to those moving in the world of autism. When the reader picks up this book, it will be either out of recognition or curiosity but when they put it down, the simple and complicated details from these stories will create the possibility of greater connection and understanding among us all.

We are currently accepting submissions of prose and poetry, not to exceed 5,000 words. Deadline: January 15, 2007. Please send entire manuscript with SASE to K. Anderson, 53 Christopher Street, Wakefield, RI 02879. It will not be possible to return manuscripts.

Please see our website (www.gravitypullsyouin.com) for more details.

Feel free to direct any questions to kyra@gravitypullsyouin.com.

Call for Submissions: Boston Fiction Festival

THE BOSTON FICTION FESTIVAL is accepting submissions for live reading at the Festival in summer of 2007 and subsequent publication in our annual review. Submitting authors should expect to read at the Festival in order to receive payment. New England residents are strongly encouraged to submit, but all writers are welcome. Looking for lively, literary fiction. This year, we are also accepting Sci-Fi.

Submissions should be 3-20 pages. There is no fee associated with submitting. Self-contained novel excerpts and multiple story subs are OK. Send submission, cover and SASE to: Attn: Armand Inezian, Faculty Building, Curry College 1071 Blue Hill Ave. Milton, MA 02186. For more info see: www.fictionfest.com

Last year, LM Editor Ericka Lutz read at the festival and had a wonderful experience.

Call For Proposals: Mothering and Popular Culture

CFP: Mothering and Popular Culture (collection)

I am looking for papers for an edited collection, under provisional contract with McGill-Queen's University Press, tentatively called Mediated Moms: Mothering and Popular Culture.

The proposed scholarly volume will examine the topic of mothers, mothering, and motherhood within and across all forms of twentieth and twenty-first century popular cultures. Possible areas to consider include, but are not limited to, the following:

-TV shows, including talk shows, family dramas, sitcoms, and cartoons;
-print and electronic journalism and celebrity rags;
-Internet sites including blogs and homepages;
-advertising;
-visual art including photography and mixed media;
-film;
-music;
-graphic fiction;
-magazines;
-best-selling literatures.

Please send 1-2 page abstracts via email to Liz Podnieks (Ryerson
University), lpodniek@ryerson.ca by November 1, 2006. Please
include your affiliation as well as nationality (for govt of Canada
funding purposes). Contributors will be notified by December 20, 2006;
completed papers (20 pages) will be due by April 1, 2007.

Enquiries welcome.

Literary Mama Blog Tour: Food for Thought

Today's stop of the Literary Mama blog tour takes us to LM's Literary Reflections co-editor Caroline Grant's blog Food for Thought.

Although Grant writes frequently about her love of cooking and her favourite recipes, this is not a "food" blog per se. Rather, Food for Thought reads like a cookbook passed down through the family, a social history featuring a recipe for Mom's Fruit Crisp on one page and how a news event touched their lives on the next.

In her most recent post, she writes about the milestone event of her sons playing (nicely) together for the first time.

When people consider having a second child, one argument in favor of expanding the family is always that you're giving your first child a playmate, a best friend, a true companion who will be in their corner long after you fade from the planet.

Once you have that second, you're too busy referreeing petty disputes about who gets to sit on the blue chair NOW, and who had a longer turn with the ukuelele.

Caroline also blogs about motherhood and academia at Mama, Ph.D. (also the title of the anthology she and co-editor Elrena Evans are compiling on the subject).

LM Blog Tour: Peter's Cross Station

Literary Mama's E-zine editor Shannon L. C. Cate's blog, Peter's Cross Station, chronicles what it is like to be a "life-partnered, over-educated, tea-not-coffee-drinking lesbian co-parenting the planet's cutest child," and to live in a "a queer interracial family in the times of George W. Bush". Blog fans may recognize her as the voice behind "Waiting for Nat" (Nat has since arrived and is now 18 months old). Cate weaves together the personal and the political, writing one moment about her daughter's love of language and another about the importance of getting a passport for Nat:

See, none of the three people in our legal family share a last name and the parents and child don't share a race, and the parents have no legal marriage status. But once we have a photo id for Nat we can cobble together our photo ids, Nat's photo id, Nat's birth certificate, our adoption decree and...voila! Proof that we all belong to each other for sure. So Nat can't get snatched by crazy Oklahomans claiming we aren't really her parents or whatall.

Cate also features photos of her gorgeous daughter Nat (aka She Who Must be Adored) that make one's heart simply melt.

Literary Mama Columnist in Wondertime Magazine

Literary Mama columnist Deesha Philyaw (The Girl is Mine) has written an article on tackling teasing in the Fall 2006 issue of Wondertime. The article, which features Philyaw's daughter's experiences, looks at the psychology of teasing and what parents can do to help. Wondertime is a relatively new parenting magazine that focuses on parenting young children (birth to six). The familiar voices of Sandra Tsing Loh and Catherine Newman are also featured in the magazine.

Literary Mama Blog Tour: This Woman's Work

Today's stop on the Literary Mama Blog Tour is at LM OpEd Editor Dawn Friedman's blog, This Woman's Work.

On her blog, Dawn writes about mothering, writing, and writing about mothering. In addition to writing about her two lovely children and the attempt to juggle work and family, Dawn writes about infertility, miscarriage and open adoption (her daughter Madison was brought to their family through domestic, open adoption).

In her post from August 1, she writes about her occasional jealousy towards her daughter's birth mother, Jessica:

. . . the first time I became aware of being jealous of Jessica was after we brought Madison home and one day I was examining her little body in the besotted way a new mother has and I noticed her beautiful, beautiful thumbs. Madison has very elegant thumbs; I do not. Madison gets her thumbs from Jessica, who also has very capable graceful hands with long fingers and thumbs. I have hands that look like they belong on the toddler walking doll I had as a kid. My hands have big palms and stubby little fingers. I didn’t feel like I could measure up to those thumbs. I didn’t feel capable of parenting a child with such elegant thumbs.

Her thumbs represented every way that I felt I fell short of all that Madison needs and deserves. People with thumbs like that — what did I have to teach them? She would grow up beautiful and full of grace and I would remain the leaden lumpy person that I am, someone who doesn’t understand how to pick out the right shade of lipstick, how to rhumba, or how to speak fluent French. In short, someone who didn’t deserve such a daughter. And I felt jealous of Jessica, with her undeniably lovely hands that had shown up there at the ends of the arms of the person who was supposed to be my child.

Dawn has recently started up a second blog focusing on secondary infertility. At Another Child, Dawn and a number of other bloggers share their experiences, outline recent fertility developments in the news, and run a forum for parents wanting support.

Literary Mama Update: Salon.com, Washington Post and Parenting

Literary Mama Senior Editor Marjorie Osterhout's article Super Sis, about one sister's transformation into the world's coolest aunt, appears in the August issue of Parenting magazine

Literary Mama Associate Editor Helaine Olen's interview with Tracy Thompson, author of Ghost in the House: Motherhood, Raising Children, and Struggling with Depression is featured on Salon.com.

Literary Mama Creative Nonfiction Editor Shari MacDonald Strong was recently the guest blogger at Leslie Morgan Steiner's On Balance blog at washingtonpost.com. Based on the comments, her piece, Russian Orphan Makes Six, about international adoption seems to have touched a nerve.

Single Mom Seeking Causes Stir at Washington Post

Who knew that dating as a single mom would cause such a stir?

On July 3rd - 4th , Literary Mama's Rachel Sarah was the guest blogger at The Washington Post for Leslie Morgan Steiner's "On Balance" column. Read it here: "Single Mom Seeks Play Dates, Blind Dates."

But beware! Her short, light-hearted piece on dating as a single mom proved to be controversial.

Leslie Morgan Steiner warned:

"Rachel -- Get your thick skin on. . . I had no idea there was so much sexist vitriol out there! Does this rabid prejudice against single moms ring true for you? It is INSANE!. . ."

Literary Mama's Senior Editor Ericka Lutz wrote into the Washington Post:

I am quite stunned by the nature of so many of the comments! Scary, sexist, judgmental, hurtful. If you're interested in visiting a forum for intelligent mother-writers without the venom, I suggest you come by Literary Mama.

Rachel Sarah has a regular column here where you can get a fuller sense of her life as a strong, wonderful mother and person.

This June, the American Jewish Press Association awarded Rachel Sarah's single parenting columns for j., the Jewish news weekly of Northern California a Louis Rapoport Award for Excellence in Commentary. Of course, many of these dates have made it into her Literary Mama column, "Single Mom Seeking," too.

One of her recent love stories also won Tango Magazine's "Romance Story Submission."

Rebecca Kaminsky guest blogger at Washington Post

Just wanted to let folks know that today (Tuesday, June 20) LM's own Rebecca Kaminsky will be a guest blogger, filling in for Leslie Morgan Steiner at her parenting "work-life" blog on The Washington Post's website. You will find her at: On Balance.

And please join in the dialogue by posting a comment!

You can read more of Rebecca Kaminsky's work at one of her columns here at Literary Mama: Down Will Come Baby

Caitlin Flanagan Interview and Literary Mama Managing Editor on CNN

When Caitlin Flanagan's editor approached me about reviewing her book, I asked her if Flanagan would agree to an interview with me. I had already read To Hell With All That: Loving and Loathing Our Inner Housewife and was, in fact, penning my review for Literary Mama when she contacted me. And I really wanted the opportunity to have a little peek at the woman behind the persona. So, earlier this week, I had the interesting experience of chatting with Flanagan over the phone. She revealed to me her advice for being an mother-writer and surviving the publicity whirl, some clarification around the omission of the infamous "when a mother works, something is lost" line from her book, and her favourite easy dinner recipe, among other things I'll include in the author profile.

I also asked her about her appearance on The Colbert report (Salon.com has the video for those who missed it). I wanted to ask her in particular about the "lobotomy" exchange as I wanted to confirm that her comments had more to do with being on Comedy Central, than with what she truly believed.

This was her clearly prepared response to my question: "The Colbert Report is a piece of serious television journalism. No one is to construe it as comedy. When Stephen and I talked on air, we were talking journalist to journalist, American guy to American gal. And that's the follow-up."

***

Managing Editor Andrea Buchanan's book Mother Shock was listed as one of the top 10 books to buy for mother's day on About.com.

On Mother's Day, Andi was on CNN to talk about her books, It's a Boy: Women Writers on Raising Sons and It's a Girl: Women Writers on Raising Daughters. Andi's blog entry, which describes her experience and links to the transcript, can be found here.

USA Today, Readings, Censorship and More

Managing Editor Andrea Buchanan was featured in today's edition of USA Today. In the article, Literary Mothers Gender-flect, Andi discusses her books It's a Boy: Women Writers on Raising Sons and It's a Girl: Women Writers on Raising Daughters and shares her personal experience with raising both a son and a daughter. Andi will be in New York on Saturday for a reading at Coliseum Books at 2pm and will be joining Miriam Peskowitz (The Truth Behind the Mommy Wars) for a Mother Talk hosted by Isabel Kallman of Alpha Mom.

Joyce Maynard appeared on the Today show on Tuesday to discuss her take on the mother-daughter relationship as revealed in her essay, "The World's Most Beautiful Baby -- Take Two" in It's a Girl: Women Writers on Raising Daughters.

Popular children's author Patricia Polacco recently had her invitation to speak at the International Reading Association (IRA) Conference revoked after refusing to soften her criticism of the "No Child Left Behind" mandate in her speech. Her website indicates that the conference sponsor SRA/McGraw-Hill was not comfortable with her position as they publish a number of the texts and materials which support the No Child Left Behind mandate.

LM contributor Elrena Evans will have her essay Birthing: A Process in Vignettes included in the anthology Twentysomething Essays by Twentysomething Writers.

On May 6th, former Literary Mama Editor Sophia Raday read from her essay "Shotgun Wedding," which is included in the anthology Tied in Knots: Funny Stories from the Wedding Day. She will be doing a reading from her essay "Panamerico" in the anthology Mexico, A Love Story at Get Lost Travel Books in San Francisco on May 25.

With a number of recently published books fueling the Mommy Wars mythology, it is refreshing to see The Motherhood Manifesto receiving some press.

LM Wants Your Opinion: Call for Submissions

Literary Mama is looking for short (500-900 words), strong, topical, opinionated pieces for the monthly OpEd feature. LM is not a paying market but it is read by some 500,000 parents and writers as well as editors and agents. Click here for submission guidelines.

In order to help get those synapses firing, here are the upcoming themes:

June

The Stories We Tell: Books, urban legends, television shows, gossip
-- what do you think of when you hear the word stories? How have the
stories you've heard shaped you? How do the stories you've told
define you? We're looking for short, strong, opinionated essays on
anything that can fit the theme "The Stories We Tell." Ties to
current events a big plus!

July

Crossing State Lines: We want to hear your short, strong, opinionated
essays that resonate with our op-ed theme of Crossing State Lines. Is
there something going on in the world today that makes this theme
resonate with you? Whether you're talking about travel, laws, culture
or Red State/Blue State politics, we want to hear what you have to say.

August

Square Pegs, Round Holes: Fitting in, sticking out. The assumptions
we make about each other and how they drive our policies or our
principles. What's happening in the world today that fits our theme
of Square Pegs, Round Holes? We want to hear your short, strong,
opinionated essays on this month's theme.

Literary Mama Update

Once again, Literary Mamas have been busy.

Literary Mama Columnist and Senior Columns Editor Rachel Sarah's Flawed and Fabulous Moms is May's Big Story on BabyCenter.com. In her article, Rachel interviews a number of real-life, imperfect mothers about topics like maternal guilt and the myth of doing it all -- a much-needed message at a time when we are likely to be bombarded with the images of toned, devoted, changing-a-diaper-is-better-than-winning-an-Oscar, seemingly-perfect celebrity mothers in the lead up to Mother's Day. A number of LM contributors are quoted and there is a nice link to Literary Mama.

Associate Profiles Editor Helaine Olen's wonderful essay Meet You at the Sandboox -- After Class appeared in the April 30 edition of the Washington Post. In it, she challenges the necessity of baby music/gym/language classes and focuses on the need for free play.

Literary Mama: Reading for the Maternally Inclined was given a lovely review by Kim Moldofsky (who blogs at Hormone-Colored Days) in Chicago Parent. "Savor this collection of works like a box of fine chocolates," she writes.

Literary Mama contributor Linda Blaskey (Babysitter) recently read with Delaware's Poet Laureate Fleda Brown as part of National Poetry Month.

Literary Mama Poetry Editor Rachel Iverson has launched her website for MomsWrite, a writing workshop for mothers in New York City.

Managing Editor Andrea Buchanan is busy with the launch of her newest anthology, It's a Girl: Women Writers on Raising Daughters. Last week, Andi read from her essay "Dirty Laudry Saved My Baby's Life," which is featured in Therese Borchard's recently released anthology, The Imperfect Mom. On April 27, there was a broadcast of her interview on Lisa Belkin's "Life's Work" show on XM Satellite Radio's "Take Five" channel, and Andi and a number of the book's contributors spoke at a MotherTalk in Philadelphia. This past Saturday there was a MotherTalk in Bethesda, MD featuring Andi, Miriam Peskowitz (The Truth Behind the Mommy Wars), and Marion Winik (Above Us Only Sky). An interview with Andi will be featured in USA Today's May 10th Mother's Day edition and Andi will be making the following appearances in the upcoming weeks:

Monday, May 1, 10 am - I'll be on Philadelphia's morning TV show "10!" on NBC 10 talking about "It's a Girl"

Wednesday, May 3, 7 pm - "It's a Girl" reading at Barnes & Noble featuring myself and local contributors at the Rittenhouse Square Barnes & Noble, Philadelphia, PA

Wednesday, May 10, 10 am - Speaking at a meeting of the Neighborhood Parenting Program, 4620 Griscom Street, Philadelphia

Saturday, May 13, 2 pm - "Mamapalooza" reading at Coliseum Books, NYC

Saturday, May 13, 7:30 pm - MotherTalk featuring me and Miriam Peskowitz talking about "It's a Girl," hosted by Alpha Mom, New York, NY

Sunday, May 14, 6 pm - Radio interview on "Positive Living" WTKF 107.3

Highlighting Literary Mamas

Once again, the Literary Mama editors have been busy over the last month.

While in Virginia for the VA Festival of the Book, Managing Editor Andi Buchanan, Miriam Peskowitz and Barbara Ehrenreich spoke on a panel about "Women, Family and Work: A Candid Discussion" at the UVA Bookstore. Andi discusses the panel in more detail on her blog.

LM Editor Jennifer Margulis hosted a live web chat at Pregnancy.org on Why Babies Do What They Do, based on some of the findings from her recently published book, Why Babies Do That.

Singing Our Praises

It seems like every time I sit down to write, something more immediate calls me away. The toddler refuses to nap. The baby is fussy with an ear infection. The dog needs to be taken to the vet.

The nice thing about being involved in a community of mother writers is knowing that so many others are trying to do the same thing -- balance work and writing and raising children and trying to carve out an identity outside of parenting.

And so when one of us finds professional success -- acknowldgement from the outside world that we are not toiling away in vain -- we are so genuinely pleased. There is a real desire to celebrate each other's work.

So we are thrilled to note a few recent successes by members of the Literary Mama community:

Literary Mama Contributor Gayle Brandeis's short fiction piece, A Long Time, has been recognized as a Milion Writers Award Notable Story of 2005. Judges will be selecting the top ten online short stories for 2005 in April.

Literary Mama Associate Editor Helaine Olen has had her piece, A Truce in the Mommy Wars, published on Salon.com. In her article, Olen interviews Leslie Morgan Steiner, author of the recently published anthology, Mommy Wars: Stay-at-Home and Career Moms Face Off on Their Choices, Their Lives, Their Families. (I have yet to read the Steiner book but I am thrilled to see that Amazon customers who are buying her anthology are also buying Miriam Peskowitz's wonderful book The Truth Behind The Mommy Wars.) Literary Mama has published an excerpt from Steiner's book (Terri Minsky's The Mother Load) in Literary Reflections.

Finally, the NPN anthology, Using Our Words, is in its second printing now. Hip Mama recently published a review of the anthology, and a number of the book's authors (including a number of Literary Mama contributors) will be reading at the following bookstores:

Sunday, April 23 @ 4:00 PM
Mrs. Dalloway's
2904 College Avenue in Berkeley
(510) 704-8222

Monday, May 1 @ 7:30 PM
Black Oak Books
Shattuck Avenue in Berkeley
(510) 486-0698

Using Our Words: A New Anthology by Parent Writers

For many parent writers, it is enough of a challenge to find a spare moment to jot down our thoughts about parenting, our children, our new roles, and our shifting identities. Finding the additional time to research the publishing market, draft query letters, devise a marketing plan and get to a post office to send out our manuscripts often feels impossible. A number of parent writers have sought out alternatives to traditional publishing avenues and instead choose to showcase their work through online literary magazines, self-published zines, and blogs.

In California, Neighborhood Parents Network, a Bay Area parenting organization, has taken the unique step of editing, publishing and distributing an anthology of essays authored by group members, former members and friends. Using Our Words: Moms and Dads on Raising Kids in the Modern Neighborhood, edited by Kathy Briccetti, Lysa Hale, & Donna Jaffe, is a collection of essays by 29 authors, described as follows:

The voices of a single mom, gay dad, foster mom, mother of twins, a couple adopting cross-culturally, stepmother, and a transgendered mother ring out in this collection of intimate essays from an urban neighborhood. In these 38 engaging pieces, moms and dads rekindle sexual relationships, cope with potty talk at the dinner table, challenge gender stereotypes, referee food fights, and define modern fatherhood. From pregnancy hyperemesis to teenage alienation, sleep deprivation to report cards, these parents are negotiating the modern parenting landscape. These writers are politically conscious, contemporary parents in the process of holding their children close while simultaneously letting them go.

Authors include Literary Mama's own Sybil Lockhart (Reviews Editor and Mama in the Middle Columnist), Heidi Raykeil (Columns Editor and Sex in the Suburbs Columnist), Joanne Hartman (Profiles Editor and Mother Angst columnist), Rachel Sarah (Columns Editor and Single Mom Seeking Columnist), and Sophia Raday (Mommy Athens, Daddy Sparta Columnist), and LM contributors Dayna Macy, Suzanne LaFetra, and Rachel Hollowgrass.

Copies of the anthology can be ordered through NPN's website.

Naughty Mommy and Tucker Carlson

Literary Mama Editor, Columnist and Naughty Mommy Heidi Raykeil was featured on The Situation with Tucker Carlson on MSNBC last night. Seems like she had Mr. Carlson feeling a little hot and bothered under his trademark bow tie. The transcript can be found here (about half way down the page).

More from The Naughty Mommy

Just in time for Valentine's Day, Literary Mama's The Naughty Mommy is at it again! This time she's been answering readers' questions over at The Washington Post.

Another LM Anthology Reading in Oakland

This one was close to my heart because it took place in my cozy neighborhood independent bookstore. Much has been written about the sudden death of the owner, Debi Echlin, just two months ago, and she truly was a remarkable woman. Local Author (of one of my favorite books of last year, The Unthinkable Thoughts of Jacob Green) Josh Braff
has said she was an "upbeat sparkplug of a lady," and I have happy memories of Debi helping me find just the right books for my Reader Daughter. So when I read that night, from the LM Anthology, it was for Debi, as she had been just like a mother to so many. Literary Mama could have been her own title.

New owner Kathleen Caldwell had featured the Literary Mama Anthology and a promotion for the reading in the storefront's window, right next to Deborah Tannen's new book and Po Bronson's latest. The small store was packed that evening. As Ericka Lutz had put it -- when discussing the order in which the seven of us would read -- we started with humor, ended with sex, and had all the heavy stuff in the middle. (Jennifer Eyre White added: just like a good date.)

Storeowner Kathleen found it "really is possible to create an enormous community in a small space" and you could feel it that night. That's what a reading can bring about. If there's one in your area, go for the camaraderie, and we'll let you know the when and where right here.

Life After Today: Catching Up With Author Heidi Raykeil

I had a chance to catch up with Literary Mama Senior Editor and Columnist Heidi Raykeil after her interview with Ann Curry on the Today Show. Heidi was interviewed about her first book Confessions of a Naughty Mommy: How I Found My Lost Libido and came across as calm, cool and collected.

She revealed the secret of handling the spotlight. Not meditation, not breathing exercises, not an early morning session with a zen master. Nope, truth be known, Heidi had spent the previous evening dealing with a stomach bug which hit her and her family. Instead of drinking champagne or having some well-deserved "naughty" moments in her swish hotel room, she alternated between curling up on the bathroom floor and ringing housekeeping to bring up more towels to throw up in. The next morning she was so happy not to feel nauseous (or to be dealing with vomit-covered (but oh so high thread count) hotel sheets) that her "I'm on national TV!" jitters all but disappeared. Ah, the glamourous life of the writer mother.

Heidi revealed that it also helped to remember that her writing was inspired by her children. She first started writing as a way to help her process the death of her baby boy (her essay Johnny, which also appears in the just-published Literary Mama anthology, is a heartbreakingly beautiful tribute to her son). She says, "So when I was freaking out in the bathroom of the Today show I thought of Johnny, and how this was all a gift from him, and how he would have never got me started on this writing path if it wasn't something I could handle. And then I was calm."

Having her husband and daughter with her was also helpful. She says, "seeing them I was able to remember what really matters: no matter what I say on national TV, they'll still love me, my parents will still love me, my friends will still love me -- although my friends will also tease me mercilessly about my hair and nervous habits only they would recognize."

Since appearing on the Today show, Heidi has done local tv and radio interviews and will be talking about her book on cable radio. She was even 'recognized' in a local shop (the shopkeeper failed to cut her a deal, however). She admits that she finds the whole publicity process a bit daunting as she became a writer in part "because you get to sit in a room by yourself" and had hoped to cut her teeth on a few bookstore readings before appearing on national TV. (Her husband, on the other hand, shines in the spotlight, reinforcing yet again why they work so well together (yes, the suggestion that he don a dress and do her readings has been made.)) She also finds it a little strange to think that people she once knew (high school classmates, ex-boyfriends) might see you her in this context.

Heidi details the wild ride that was her 2005 (which started with her New Year's resolution to get a literary agent) in her current Literary Mama column, Sex in the Suburbs.

Naughty Mommy Interview

Literary Mama Senior Editor Heidi Raykeil's interview with Ann Curry on the Today show can be viewed here.

After her interview aired, sales of Confession of a Naughty Mommy jumped, driving the book from #77,093 on the Amazon sales rank yesterday to #39 (and climbing) today.

In other words, today Heidi's book sold more copies than The Purpose Driven Life, the latest P.D. James mystery, Rich Dad Poor Dad, The South Beach Diet or Love Smart -- the newest offering from Dr. Phil.

So much for the notion that sometimes seems to permeate the publishing world that moms don't have time to read fiction/creative non-fiction or that there are enough "Mommy Lit" books or "Momoirs" out there.

LM Editor on Today Show

Literary Mama's own Heidi Raykeil will be appearing on NBC's Today show tomorrow morning in the 9am time-slot to promote her new book, Confessions of a Naughty Mommy.

Toronto Star Blogging Article

The Toronto Star ran an article today on "mommy blogs" and how mothers are connecting via the web. Author Andrea Gordon interviewed Literary Mama's Andi Buchanan and me (among others) for the article and Literary Mama received a nice mention in the sidebar article.

A major component of the article is about how blogging has allowed mothers to write openly about a wide range of issues they might not have a chance to (or the nerve to) otherwise discuss, including the "darker" issues like post partum depression or the decision not to breastfeed or maternal ambivalance.

Gordon also discusses how blogs not only allow mothers-writers to articulate their point of view to a wider community but how the comments function allows them to have a two-way dialogue with their readers. Although the article focuses mainly on the positive role of blogs in fostering community and allevieting maternal guilt, she also mentions how the relative anonomity of the blog can bring out the worst in some people.

Writer (and former blogger) Ayelet Waldman believes that it is the attempt to capture readers that drives the sometimes critical nature of the blogosphere: "There is a tone that you have to adopt in order to make your voice heard amidst the general cacophony. ...You have to make it pop. And an easy way for it to pop is to make it snarky."

I have to disagree. In my experience, there are very few consistently "snarky" mother bloggers. I have found that the voices of good bloggers (just as the voices of any good writers) are sincere. Some days they are snarky, other days they are tender. It seems cynical (and untrue) to make assumptions that bloggers are adopting a certain tone simply to build their readership.

Gordon concludes her piece with an excerpt from Miriam Peskowitz's response to Linda Hirshman (also featured on her blog), which in my opinion much more elegantly summarizes the nature of the mother blog world:

On our blogs, we write about the work that fills our days. It may read like boring trivia, but it's the stuff of everyday life, and it matters. We have joys and regrets, happiness and anger. These lives don't come with fancy names or titles, but they're honest and they're real. We've created an interesting and connected world. We've ended the awful isolation that can affect so many moms and dads. We're here, we're real, and we come from all walks of life.

A New Approach to Publishing?

Bethany Hiitola is a blogging mom who is taking the self-publishing aspect of the blogosphere one step further. She had posted a draft of her novel, Postpartum Euphoria, online in the hopes of generating some buzz and to get some bites from agents or editors. Could this be the start of something new?

The Doctor is In: more from Dr.Sue

In this week's question, Dr. Sue addresses the dangers of writing what you know (again, it has to do with other people! Why do writers always seem to come up against this "other people" issue??). This is something I grapple with often, especially as someone who writes mostly nonfction. Personal essays about my life necessarily involve other people, real people who know exactly who I'm talking about when they show up in my work. This is especially tricky when it comes to writing about my children -- one of whom now is old enough to read my stuff and take issue with it. How much is too much to say? How personal is too personal? What, really, is essential to my story, and what is just poaching off someone else's? Believe it or not, I don't publish everything I write, or even write about everything I'd like to publish. I'm squeamish about that gray area where the personal gets too personal, where the writing is more cathartic or therapeutic than in service of a story I'm trying to tell. Sometimes not writing about something too personal involving someone else quite personally is for the best; other times I think, crap, that's SUCH a great story, and I can never write it! (Because, really, what's the point of having a crazy family or a crazy life if you can't use it for material?) Dr. Sue's questioner asks:

I am writing a novel featuring a good friend as the main character. Basically, I took her life and gave it a twist, an ugly twist. While much of it is not true, there are truthful elements to it that I'm sure she will recognize and be offended by. I am debating whether or not to pursue the publication of this story. If I do, I might lose her friendship. What should I consider and what should I do?

I think sometimes nonfiction writers can get so wrapped up in the story we're telling that we forget these "characters" are real people (or based on real people) -- that's happened to me a few times on my own blog (remember the woman in the elevator who turned out to be friends with someone who read my blog and wrote to me later to say she read the entry about her? the Oobi guy?). Things are a bit less gray with fiction, but even there drawing on the personal too much can get you in trouble. I worked on a manuscript last year in which one of the main characters was very much based on someone I knew in college. Sure, there were details that I changed, things I threw in that this person would never, ever do, character traits that didn't match up. But at the very basic level, this character was inspired by this real life person, and the whole time I worked on it I wondered if it was fair to write something based on someone who might recognize themselves if they read it. Luckily for my old college friend, no one's jumped at the chance to publish it, so I don't have to confront the question asked of Dr. Sue today. Read her wise-as-always answer here.

"This is new territory. I am an explorer."

A wonderful writer and online friend is making a guest appearance on MJ Rose's blog every Friday starting today. Sue O'Doherty, PhD, is a psychologist specializing in issues affecting writers, and is no slouch herself. (And, in the interest of full disclosure, she has a lovely essay in It's a Boy.)

Today she tackles two questions from writers, one on envy and one on self-doubt. In response to the writer who grapples with self-doubt, Dr. Sue replies:

Paul Cézanne once said that each time he finished painting an apple, he believed he had solved the problem of painting apples. But then, when he moved on to the next apple, it was an entirely new apple, and he had to start all over again. ... When you feel yourself falling into the trap of self-doubt, take out a piece of paper and write the following: "This is new territory. I am an explorer." Tack it up on your bulletin board. Look at it once an hour, and write it over again if necessary. Remind yourself that the most important work you are doing is in the process itself. You are discovering and recording aspects of yourself and the world that are uniquely yours. If this were easy, there would be no point to it. You are mapping out new territory, and it may be harrowing—and, for that matter, you may not arrive at the destination you had set out for. But you will experience wonders along the way, and you will transmit them to paper to the best of your ability.

In honor of Allison Crews

Sylvia Plath. Anne Sexton. Many other mother writers dead by their own actions. And now Allison Crews.

I never knew Allison. But I was impressed with her writing and her activist work. I wrote about how my students responded to her piece When I Was Garbage in a Mothering in the Ivory Tower column here at Literary Mama called Family Lit 101. I was moved by her as they were, as were the readers of the site she produced, Girl Mom. She will be missed.

I am sorry that she felt so alone. I cry for the son she left behind. I am sad to know that another one of us literary mamas did not make it.

Think of Allison. Hug your children. And write. Damn it. Keep writing. In that way, we honor her truths with our own.

"Gardening is writing…"

A few years ago, I took the summer "off" to write. That is, I didn't teach any classes. "Off" for a mother-writer means that you still have all the same child-and-family related duties (or more, as, after all, you aren't "working"). So there I was, with a couple of months in front of me to finish a rewrite on a novel. And all I did was garden. I weeded the nasty grasses out from under 150 flagstones. I took a level area, built mounds, and planted perennials: lavender and melissa and sage and thyme and Meyer lemon. I uncovered weed roots and removed them. I got really big muscles. I did not -- could not -- write. "Gardening is writing," my friend Chris (journalist and novelist) reassured me.

Indeed, three months later, back in the thick of it all, I had a burst of autumn energy and finished the rewrite. And I think it's because I had those months to work with my body and think, even though I didn't think I was thinking.

Writing and gardening (and parenting), it's the same creative process. Sometimes slow. Sometimes thankless. And sometimes gardening is the most satisfying of all -- at least you can see what you've accomplished during the day.

Gardening is writing I reassure myself these weeks, as I wait to hear the verdict on my collection of short stories from a few agents. I'm in that writer limbo that resembles late pregnancy -- too late to do anything but wait and nest. This baby is fully viable. When do the contractions start?

I bought 1,200 pounds of stones from American Soil and Stone Products last week. And today, a big, brawny guy is going to help me move them from the sidewalk outside my house into the garden. We'll excavate a few inches of soil, lay some sand, and then I'll get to play.

In the meanwhile, the fiction department here at Literary Mama is looking for an editorial assistant. If you are a strong copyeditor, a fiction writer, and a mother, please email me. Send me a brief bio. You'll be working closely with me, Ericka, so enjoying gardening metaphors is a plus.

Amazonia

Everyone knows about the writerly obsession of checking your Amazon ranking on an hourly basis. Luckily, I don't have to go to the trouble of doing that anymore -- of actually opening up my browser and checking to see what my Amazon rank is -- because a kind and enabling friend built me a Konfabulator widget* that does the dirty work for me. It sits on my desktop, impassively displaying my Amazon rank number, which it automatically updates every 15 minutes. You know, just in case.

Still, sometimes I do like to visit my book on Amazon, just to check in and see how it's going, whether or not anyone's written a mean-spirited personal attack on me in the guise of a customer review, that sort of thing. The last time I checked in I discovered the SIP feature -- "Statistically Improbable Phrases" -- which seems to serve no purpose in terms of author obsession, though I guess now I can fret about how to raise the bar and come up with better SIPs for the next book (surely I can top grubby living! And our piano? Please! A baby could come up with something more statistically improbable!)

Yesterday I checked in and discovered that not only has Amazon revamped the page design for information on individual books, they've added some other interesting and/or meaningless features -- Concordance and Text Stats. Now when you check out a book's page, you can not only learn what so-called Statistically Improbable Phrases the book contains, you can also find out what its Flesch-Kincaid Index is and what the top 100 most frequently used words in the book happen to be. The Concordance and Text Stats for my book reveal that I used the word "mother" 305 times ("baby" came in second at 235 – not "shock," as you might expect, which had only 113 instances -- and Emi will be happy to know that her name shows up 60 times). I also learned the book sports a respectable Flesch Index of 57.9 and a Flesch-Kincaid Index of 10.4, though its Fog Index of 12.4 is troubling, as that indicates the book might be "difficult to read." Still, the manuscript appears to be only 10% dominated by complex words, and I'm sure readers will be reassured to learn that despite the fact that my average sentence contains 20.9 words, most of them are no longer than 1.5 syllables.

Why is Amazon doing this? To give authors more to obsess about? Would anyone other than a book's author care about its Fog Index or percentage of word complexity? It's a bit odd to see my book dissected like this. I mean, sure, the word count game is one I played daily as I worked on the book – yippee! I broke the 30K mark! Wait, no, I edited a bunch of stuff out, now it's back to 25K! Damn! But seeing it there in black and white – "Sentences: 2,606" – is a strange thing. Really? Mother Shock is only 2,606 sentences? Somehow it felt longer. 2,606 sentences just doesn't sound like a whole lot. Is it? Does her book have more sentences than mine? Does that make hers better? Wait, quick, what's my ranking again?

But even more meaningless and intriguing than those statistics are the "Fun Stats," which report that my book contains 5,344 words per dollar, and that it's 5,392 words to the ounce.

Crap. I weigh about a million words.

* If you are an author with steely self-control, whose worth as a person is not tied in any way to your Amazon ranking, and you are interested in having one of these widgets for yourself, give me a holler. I'll hook you up!

How did I miss this?

Oprah has a whole page of writers talking about balancing writing and motherhood. It's a hobby of mine -- seeing how other writing women somehow manage to product readable work between diaper changes, sandwich making, and carpooling. No majorly new insights here (was hoping someone had a magical tip guaranteed to make it all swing easy) but it's nice seeing that even the most successful mama-writers struggle with the balance.

The Terrible Twos

More on writing frankly about one's children: I always, always, always look forward to Catherine Newman's weekly column about life with Birdy, her two-year-old daughter, and her five-year-old son Ben. Bringing Up Ben & Birdy is published every Monday on the commercial site ParentCenter and in my opinion it's the very best feature that site has to offer. Newman seems to hit just the right note between telling it sweet and telling it straight. This week she writes about Birdy's startling transformation from a baby with a sunny disposition into an extremely strong-willed toddler -- on the very day she turns two.

And that reminds me -- I've been meaning to pick up Newman's memoir, Waiting for Birdy: A Year of Frantic Tedium, Neurotic Angst, and the Wild Magic of Growing a Family, for some time now. Must add it to the list.

Writing Frankly About Your Kids: Is It The Last Great Taboo?

There's been a lot of negative buzz online lately about Ayelet Waldman's new column on Salon, which she recently started after giving up posting on her addictively readable parenting blog, Bad Mother. I have to admit that at times I've been surprised, even taken aback, by just how much Waldman reveals but it's... interesting to note the vehemence of those who object to her writing frankly about her family and her battle with bipolar disorder. In some circles, it seems, writing about one's children is the last great taboo. I guess some people still believe that once you become a mother you should no longer admit to having feelings others might deem inappropriate. I can't imagine Salon readers being half as shocked as many of them appear to be in the Letters section if Waldman were writing a series of columns on, oh I don't know, sex with weasels or something.

Women Writers: Dull? Depressed? Domestic?

This story is more than a week old but I've still chosen to link it now because it's of particular interest to women who write about mothering. The Guardian recently took British writers Ali Smith and Toby Litt to task for characterizing the work of many women writers as "dull, depressed and domestic" in their introduction to New Writing 13, a collection of literary fiction they co-edited. Writers including AL Kennedy and Ursula K Le Guin -- and Ali Smith and Toby Litt themselves -- respond here, here, and here. Thanks again to Andi for the heads-up.